Next Generation NDE Sensor Systems as IIoT Elements of Industry 4.0

Industry 4.0 (I4.0) describes the current revolution of the industrial world with a strong impact on the complete production sector. Data about production processes and the corresponding material and product status are the key elements. All over the world, the protagonists of I4.0 are facing the challenges to define appropriate concepts for I4.0 infrastructure, data exchange, communication interfaces and efficient procedures for the interaction of I4.0 elements. The role of future Nondestructive Evaluation (NDE4.0) and corresponding workflows (i.e. data generation and evaluation) will change accordingly. Thus, NDE4.0 systems will be elements of the Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) that communicate with the production machines and devices. They become an integral part of the digital production world and the industrial data space. This paper is a summarized overview of our current developments as well as of general key technologies and future challenges to enable the paradigm change from classical NDT toward NDE4.0, starting with approaches on signal processing, artificial intelligence-based information generation and decision making, generic data formats and communication protocols. For illustration purposes, prototypical implementations of our work are presented. This includes a pilot development of a modern human-machine-interaction by the use of assistance technologies for manual inspection.